"Look!" Joe shouted.
The rider suddenly sprang upright, his feet gripping the saddle. With the ease of a circus rider, the cowboy stood straight, while the horse continued to gallop. With the crowd paying a roaring tribute to his feat, the rider aimed a white-feathered arrow and let it fly. With a thud it cut through the middle of the paper heart!
"Did you see the white feathers?" Joe gasped.
158 "Let"s talk to this guy," Frank said excitedly, pushing his way through the cheering throng.
Suddenly Frank froze in his tracks. The cowboy had continued at a gallop directly to the judges" stand. The rider bent over and scooped up his prize money, which a dumfounded judge held in an envelope.
Then, spurring his mount faster, the archer vaulted a low fence and disappeared over the shimmering prairie in a cloud of dust!
CHAPTER XVIII.
Fire in the Woods.
"well, I"ll be a horned toad!" Joe exclaimed as he watched the cloud of dust vanish in the distance.
The archer had ridden off so swiftly, none of the boys had been able to get a good look at his face. Chet said he was not the man they had seen in the woods, however.
Although the trap they had laid so carefully had not been a success, it had not been without a reward. It had produced another white-feathered arrow! Frank, eager to examine it, cried: "Let"s get over to that target p.r.o.nto, before it"s taken away!"
The three boys elbowed their way through the surging rodeo crowd to the spot where the straw-stuffed dummy lay grotesquely on the ground. The arrows were still sticking from it like porcupine quills.
159.
160 Frank bent down and pulled the winning shaft from the heart of the effigy. After examining it carefully, he turned to Joe.
"It"s identical to the other white-feathered arrows."
"Which means," Chet put in, "that the archer who just left this is the same man who shot at you in the woods."
"Maybe yes, maybe no," Frank observed. "But I"m going to find out. This time n.o.body"s going to stop me!"
"How can you do it?" Chet asked.
"We"ll go back to the woods," Frank replied, "but this time we"ll make it an overnight expedition so we can stay and watch as long as we want to. I think the stone with the crooked arrow on it may even be a meeting place of some kind."
"We"ll take Pye and Terry along," Joe said. "That is, if Hank will let us."
"I"ll ask him as soon as we get back," Frank said. "Anyway, I want to find out from him if he smokes Ramiro cigarettes. I forgot to ask him."
Frank already had examined the pack and found there were no gas-filled tubes in the cigarettes. So a momentary notion he had that the crooks might have changed the name from Arrow to Ramiro had proved false.
Upon reaching home, the boys rubbed down their 161 horses, then Frank approached Hank. He was standing alongside the corral smoking a cigarette. Frank explained their proposed venture and asked if Pye and Terry might go along.
"No!" the foreman fairly barked. "Yo5 can"t take my ranch hands every time yo" a mind to do some sightseein"!"
Frank realized it was useless to argue with the obstinate foreman. The boy turned the subject of conversation to cigarettes, asking what Hank smoked.
"Ramiros," he replied, and stalked off.
"Yo" sh.o.r.e look like a lost dogie," a voice said suddenly. "What"s on yore mind?"
Looking up, Frank saw Terry near him. On a hunch the boy asked the singing cowboy what he really thought of Hank.
"Mighty ornery," Terry replied. "But he"s loyal to Mis" Hardy, if that"s what yo"re drivin" at."
"Thanks," Frank said. "See you later."
The boy went straight to Ruth Hardy and brought her up to date on the progress in solving the Crowhead mystery. She backed up Terry a hundred per cent in his conclusion about Hank"s honesty. In view of her faith in her foreman"s honesty, Frank said nothing of the telephone conversation Chet had overheard in the bunkhouse.
"I"ll see what I can do about convincing him to 162 let Pye and Terry go with you on your ride. I don"t want you to go alone."
After dinner she summoned Hank. The boys cleared out when the sullen foreman entered. Their i cousin took him into the living room alone, closing the door behind her.
Half an hour later the two emerged, Hank"s expression unchanged. But as he strode back to the bunkhouse, Mrs. Hardy came to the boys.
"Everything"s fixed up," she said, smiling.
"You mean we get Pye and Terry?" Joe asked quickly.
"They"ll ride with you tomorrow," his cousin replied. "Hank didn"t want to let them go, because he"s so shorthanded. But I told him a day"s work wouldn"t matter, if we can clear away this cloud that"s hanging over the ranch."
It was growing dusk when Frank and Joe went to tell Pye and Terry about the next day"s plan. Both were eager for the trip, especially the Indian.
"We track bad hombre Indian way," he said enthusiastically.
"How"s that?" Joe asked.
"Use wild animal feet." He grinned. "He no find us."
"How do we get the animals to do that?" Joe asked, laughing.
"You no savvy," Pye replied. "Pye make animal 163 feet from wood. Tie on bottom of boots. Look like animal track."
The brothers thought Pye was fooling, but next morning, while the boys and Terry were saddling their mounts, Pye ran up to them excitedly.
"Here animal feet," he said proudly.
In his hands he held five pairs of queer-shaped wooden contraptions, with leather thongs for tying them to the boots. "Bear, wolf, fox, wildcat, deer," he identified them.
The Indian handed one pair of "feet" to each rider. The travelers hung them alongside their saddlebags, which were filled with food and cans of tomato juice. Each man carried a blanket secured to the back of his saddle. Presently the five trotted off.
Before they had gone far, Frank noticed that the Indian carried a bow and arrows. They were partly hidden under his rope.
"What you got there, Pye?" he asked, pointing to the weapon.
"Me carry bow and arrows you boy make," Pye answered. "Maybe we shoot. Savvy?"
As on the previous trip, the riders became silent once they had settled down to the long jaunt. At first Terry burst forth with a Western ditty, but as they neared the mysterious woods, even he became quiet.
164 They went straight to the spot where Frank had seen the mysterious rider.
"He"s been back!" the boy exclaimed, dismounting to examine fresh hoofprints.
Marks of a pony were all about the area, indicating the animal had stood and pawed the ground. Where had his master been while the pony waited? Examination proved the rider had not dismounted.
"Let"s see where the hoofprints lead to," Joe said.
He and Pye took the lead, with Frank, Terry, and Chet in a row behind. The stout boy glanced fearfully over his shoulder, as if afraid an unseen hand were ready to grab the last man in line.
Picking their way carefully along a sort of trail, the five riders approached an area of spa.r.s.ely wooded ground, then emerged on the other side of the forest.
"Here"s where I saw him get away," Chet announced.
"And here"s where we lose him again," Frank declared, examining the hoofprints.
Marks of a horse"s hoofs became intermingled with the hoofprints of cows. Soon they were lost in the welter of hundreds of marks made by the roving animals.
But the riders continued on, hoping to pick up the trail. Suddenly Pye reined in.
"What"s up?" Frank asked.
165 "Look! Top trees!" the Indian cried, a note of alarm in his voice.
"It"s smoke!" Chet exclaimed.
A blue curl spiraled into the cloudless sky, some miles in the distance.
"Forest fire!" Terry burst out.
Frank and Joe looked at each other. Another tragedy for Cousin Ruth!
CHAPTER XIX.
The Dangling Rope.
fear gripped the hearts of the group from Crow-head. If this were a forest fire, it might spread to the open prairie, consuming miles and miles of pasture gra.s.s and timberland as it raced toward the buildings of the ranch.
"I"ll ride back and give the alarm," Joe volunteered. "They can get a fire-fighting plane out here to help us."
He wheeled his pony, ready to cover the grueling miles to the ranch house at racing speed.
"Wait!" Terry cried suddenly. Then he added, "What do yo" think o" this, Pye? Forest fire or camp site?"
The Indian stared long and thoughtfully at the curling smoke. He watched for indications of spreading flames but saw none.
"No forest fire," he announced laconically. "Hombre make fire. Cook grub."
167 As all eyes focused on the smoke, it seemed to fade out, confirming Pye"s notion that the blaze was under control. But under the control of human beings.
"Would any of the Crowhead cowboys be camping there?" Frank asked Pye.
"No cow, no men," the Indian answered. "Pye tell you bad place over there."
"You"ve been in that forest?" Frank queried in amazement.
"Pye no go," the man answered. "Ancestor say stay away, so stay away."
"But what"s there to make it bad?" Frank persisted.
The Indian shrugged. "Pye no know. But Pye not afraid. We go see."
"That"s the stuff." Frank praised. "Come on!"
The sun was low as they neared the forbidding forest. The sky was taking on the vivid, darkening colors of sunset. Purple and magenta clouds blended into the pink backdrop of the heavens, which were making ready to cloak the plains with darkness.
"We"d better look for a camp site," Frank suggested.
"You got plenty savvy," Pye commented admiringly. "Dark come in."
After scanning the area, Joe and Terry found a
CHAPTER XIX.
The Dangling Rope fear gripped the hearts of the group from Crow-head. If this were a forest fire, it might spread to the open prairie, consuming miles and miles of pasture gra.s.s and timberland as it raced toward the buildings of the ranch.
"I"ll ride back and give the alarm," Joe volunteered. "They can get a fire-fighting plane out here to help us."
He wheeled his pony, ready to cover the grueling miles to the ranch house at racing speed.